


Hands known before, different now

by Apsacta



Category: Twosetviolin
Genre: M/M, they meet again, things change, you know how it goes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-11
Updated: 2021-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-16 03:48:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,745
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28700169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Apsacta/pseuds/Apsacta
Summary: Of Eddy Chen, Brett remembers first a terrible haircut, messy. A shy kid, lips bitten in concentration, sitting next to him in math tutoring on Friday evening, when Brett wanted to be anywhere but there. For all his gangly limbs sticking out of overly large clothes, Eddy still looked like a child, then, and that’s how Brett remembers him, even now, even after everything else.(they grow up together, until they grow apart. then grow back together again)
Relationships: Eddy Chen & Brett Yang, Eddy Chen/Brett Yang
Comments: 25
Kudos: 58





	1. Deux arabesques

[ _Claude Debussy, Deux arabesques – harp_ ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWTe3C_RoDo)

** Arabesque n° 1 ( _andantino con moto_ ) **

The train jolts forward slowly, and Brett already feels himself drifting away, eyes unfocused. Blurred trees, naked, seen between closing eyelids, and the sky outside turning dark. It feels like Philip Glass’s double concerto for violin and cello in his head, comfortable rolling around him, familiar with repetition. No sunset, just grey turning into dark too quickly, late already. His sigh fogs the window and the trees disappear entirely, just greys and dark blues and blacks in their place, and tiny orange dots in the distance. It’s not even a full minute before his head lolls to the side, heavy against the cold glass window.

He falls asleep somewhere between the orange flashes of city streetlights and the darkness of country skies, too tired to fight it. Emerges back for a few seconds when the train shakes a little, before being lulled back to sleep by the whispers of hushed conversations somewhere far away, a lullaby, Brahms opus 49, wiegenlied. Soft and quiet and dark behind his closed eyelids.

His thoughts jumble together, half-asleep, half-awake. He’s too tired, feels it in his bones and in his head. His neck hurts.

 _Coffee isn’t a substitute for sleep, Brett._ His brother’s voice, laced with concern, mixes with his own thoughts.

‘ _Where’s the violin_ ’, sudden, and he startles himself awake, fumbles around under the amused eye of the old man in the opposite seat, panics, cold sweat until he finds it there, safely tucked under his arm. The man looks at him with something in his eye, pity maybe, then recognition, but Brett’s head is already falling to his chest. The streetlights flash a few times in the corner of his eye, and then it’s dark again. Peaceful.

He’s tired but when he blinks next, it’s morning already, pale light, milky skies, and a sudden panic, _did he miss his stop?_ But no, it’s all good, barely dawn. Miles and miles to go still, hours left. The seat across from him is empty now, the old man gone. _The violin_ , Brett thinks, but no, it’s still there, familiar shape under his arm. Ten more minutes, he thinks then, relieved, just enough time to rest his head, and then his brother’s voice again.

_Coffee isn’t a substitute for sleep, Brett. You need to rest._

And his own voice, tired, but stubborn still, a little. _Who are you? Mum?_

A fleeting look of worry, glasses taken off, cleaned before they’re pushed back on. They look alike. A little. Maybe. If you know what to look for. 

_No, but I’m your brother and I worry. You need a break. A real one this time._

And he knows. He can feel it. But work. Rehearsals. Recordings. Concerts and recitals. Planes to catch. Places to be. 

His eyelids flutter open and the light’s pink now, almost golden. The seats are filled again, a couple. They don’t look at him, don’t pay attention, so he stretches, rubs his eyes under his glasses, checks that the violin case hasn’t moved. He’s tired still, but this will do. He can rest more later. 

No more street lights or naked trees seen from the windows, just rolling fields, and the last stretches of mist hanging low. It looks sad and boring. 

He doesn’t look his best, he’s conscious, half asleep still, wrinkled clothes and crumpled face, and his hair is a mess. It’s all his brother’s plan, really, his idea, and he’s the only one to blame for this. Brett still isn’t sure. He’s nervous, somehow. For no reason. Stupid.

It’s been years. 

It’s his brother, with his stupid smile, _guess who I met last month at that conference, you know, the one I told you about,_ and Brett to look at him, feigning interest until his brother’s grin grows a little too big, a little too enthusiastic, and he’s curious for real. 

Of Eddy Chen, Brett remembers first a terrible haircut, messy. A shy kid, lips bitten in concentration, sitting next to him in math tutoring on Friday evening, when Brett wanted to be anywhere but there. For all his gangly limbs sticking out of overly large clothes, Eddy still looked like a child, then, and that’s how Brett remembers him, even now, even after everything else. 

And then his brother, wide grin, _guess who I met last month at that conference,_ and the picture he shows Brett on his phone clashes with the memories, with the fluttering eyelashes, the wonky teeth shown reluctantly, only in spite of himself, only when Brett managed to make him laugh. 

Eddy’s grown up, different from Brett’s sixteen years old best friend. He still looks awkward, though, a strained smile in the picture, with a serious look that doesn’t match Brett’s memory of him. _He recognised me, would you believe, asked about you, too. I didn’t know you guys didn’t keep in touch._

It’s complicated, really. Or maybe it isn’t. It’s hard to maintain friendships when you practice forty hours a day. 

The train slows down as it rolls through the fields, nothing much to see, really, and the sky clears, pale blue, as the sun gets higher. Brett’s starting to get hungry, uncomfortable, and he didn’t think about packing anything to eat. It’s all been kind of sudden, an impulse like he hasn’t had in a while, _hey, why don’t you come spend a few days here for a break_? 

The scenery gets flatter, just green and white, and Brett gets hungrier. There’s not much to see, hardly a tree around, hardly a cloud, fields and sheep, and rocks, but he stares at the window, half lost in thoughts. This is weird. His first holiday in years. He hopes it won’t be awkward but suspects it might be. He should have brought some food. It was awkward enough getting back in touch after all this time. 

It gets rockier as they near the sea, nice, Brett guesses, though he’s not used to that level of openness. He wouldn’t have guessed Eddy would be into that, either. The couple has left, and the opposite seat is empty again. He doesn’t know if Eddy will be the same. He sure sounded different over the phone. And not, at the same time. He really should have brought some food. 

He could do with a coffee, too, drags his fingers through his hair, hopes he doesn’t look like he feels. His brother was right and the break is long overdue. He tries not to think about it, how he was on the edge for a moment, conjures memories of his youth instead. They used to play a lot of duets together. Though he supposes Eddy doesn’t really have much time for music now. God, he’s hungry. And this train is so damn slow. 

He keeps staring out the window, and thinking about the past, and touching his violin case, almost superstitiously. It’s a habit that he’s developed while touring, half annoying, half worrying, that he’s constantly anxious about losing his instrument. He thinks about it all the time when he’s nervous, that it might be stolen, broken, forgotten on a bench. Eddy used to. He forgot his shit all the time, which does not bode well for a doctor, Brett thinks with a snort. He smiles fondly at the sheep outside.

He rubs his fingertips against his temple, watches as the air gets lighter, clearer. He can feel the first signs of a headache coming, thoughts muddled uneasy in his head, like fragments of Berg’s String Quartet n° 3 cutting in. It’s nothing but greens and browns and whites outside, and noises inside, louder and louder as people get more awake, then, suddenly, the train takes a turn and it’s all blue, and it slows down as it reaches its destination.

**Arabesque n° 2 ( _allegretto scherzando_ )**

There is a room in Eddy’s house that was always destined to be a music room. It has a piano and Eddy’s old violin somewhere in there, good acoustics, and the nicest view of the garden, with the cliff edge at the bottom, and then the sea in the distance, and the sky, clear and bright and cold, nothing but greys and blues. It is, objectively, the nicest room in the house – or it should be.

But Eddy stands in the doorway, and it’s more guilt than awe at the sight of the mess – boxes, more than he remembers, forgotten for two years, shame too then. Two years and the music room that never really got to be a music room has turned into a room where Eddy just puts everything that he doesn’t know what to do with, but means too much to be let go – and where’s the lie, honestly. He never could get rid of stuff. 

“Ah, fuck,” he mutters, because he meant to clear up the room before today, but then forgot, and now there’s no time for it.

So there are boxes and dust, because he hasn’t been in here in forever – somewhere in there, he’s sure, are books and sheet music that meant something at some point. The piano is his sister’s, and when she moved to the other side of the world Eddy sort of got custody of it, but it’s been out of tune since the move, and he never got it tuned. Another thing that he thought he’d get around to, but then forgot. The violin, though, precariously perched on top of it, is Eddy’s. He hasn’t touched it in forever.

Was it Brett, or Oliver, who used to joke about bow bugs – or whatever it was? Someone did, anyway. Now Eddy’s mildly scared to open the case. He’s going to die of shame if something happened. Especially if Brett finds out about it. 

Not that he’s got any time to check anyways. He overslept. His mistake, probably, but he stayed late the day before – got gently mocked for it as well, _the department will still be here when you come back, Eddy, go take your holiday, you need it, why are you still here?_ He stayed overtime, feeling strangely nervous for no reason at all, and he tried to tell himself that it was because he hadn’t taken that many days off in a long time, but it wasn’t entirely true. Or that it was all the caffeine – it seemed to be all that he lived off, these days, caffeine and excitement. But that wasn’t exactly true either. 

And so, he overslept, and he doesn’t really have time for anything else.

It doesn’t help, that he’s changed shirts three times since he got up. The nervousness is still there. And now, Eddy can’t really fool himself into thinking that it’s got anything to do with work. In his defence, it’s not every day that he’s got a world-class soloist coming to stay at his house. 

So yeah. Brett Yang.

The name didn’t seem to evoke anything to Eddy’s colleagues – to his great disappointment – but Eddy almost got teary-eyed simply listening to his latest Bach album, and if that’s not a sign that he’s one of the greats... He’s also, and it still feels surreal to think about it, the same guy who sat down next to Eddy one Friday evening, in a math tutoring class, and whose side Eddy stuck to for the better part of four years. 

And it’s amazing, but he still looks exactly the same, on the cover of that Bach album that Eddy’s probably bored everyone with, the same easy smile as when they were kids – minus the braces – the same sparkle in his eyes. The smile is what Eddy remembers the most, easy and open, and the laugh that came with it. He seems more guarded now, but maybe that’s just growing up.

They haven’t talked in ages. Haven’t seen each other in ages – other than the occasional promo pictures and interview excerpts that popped up in Eddy’s feed sometimes.

It might have been Eddy’s fault, with how busy he got in med school. Maybe Eddy should’ve made an effort. Maybe Brett should’ve made one too. Maybe not. Hard to tell, after so long. 

So, now he’s nervous. It used to be so easy, talking to Brett. About anything, really. Mostly stupid stuff. But what would it be like now? They've barely been in contact – two, three short phone calls, a series of messages, it hardly counts – and Eddy now feels exactly like he felt when Brett’s first message popped back in his inbox. Nervous and excited, and a little star-struck. 

So he changes shirts again – and then thinks about changing shirts once more, but there’s no time. His phone rings and Brett’s train is arriving soon, and Eddy feels like either smiling or shaking nervously, he isn’t sure. 

The first thing that hits him when he steps outside is the brightness, the way the skies are just so open and clear, like Eddy’s almost forgotten that they can be. And maybe he has, maybe he doesn’t spend enough time outside to notice it. So, as it is, it hits the moment he gets through the door.

“Ah, fuck,” he mutters again, and he pushes his glasses to his forehead to rub at his eyes. “Shit.”

It’s definitely too light, but then he takes a deep breath, smells the salt in the air, and it settles him a little, enough to make him smile. He could do with a cup of coffee, though, but he can always get some at the station – maybe stop somewhere on the way back to have one with Brett, if he wants.

The road to the station winds along the coast, narrow and rocky, but Eddy’s long been used to its twists and turns by now, barely even notices the sea to his right, all the way down the cliffs. It’s very pretty, he knows this, but it still catches him by the surprise sometimes, like he’s forgotten. But the days are short and he’s mostly out at dusk or dawn, so he can be forgiven. 

With winter at the doorstep, there’s almost no one on the road, no one outside at all. Empty fields and pebbled beaches. Even as Eddy gets into town, it’s just quiet streets. Calm. Peaceful. It’s nice. He really does tend to forget how picturesque it all is. He’s too used to driving through, knows the roads and streets like the back of his hand and doesn’t pay attention anymore. 

He gets to the station just as the train comes in, and he really is too nervous for someone who is only going to see a childhood friend. 

Only five or six people get out, and spotting Brett isn’t hard at all, if only for the violin case that would betray him in an instant. But more than that, it’s the fact that he still hasn’t changed. He probably looks exactly like the last time that Eddy saw him – though he can’t quite remember when that would have been. He’s better dressed, maybe – and Eddy knew he should’ve kept the white shirt, dammit – and are his glasses different? Eddy isn’t sure. But it’s still definitely still the same person, and Eddy feels seventeen again. 

“Eddy!”

Brett waves at him, burdened a little by his luggage and violin, but his lips stretch into a smile that is exactly like the one that Eddy remembers, and Eddy waves back. 

“How was – do you want – the train – coffee?” Eddy mumbles, cheeks going red. Still that weird, nervous-like embarrassment.

Brett laughs, hugs him quickly – a little awkward, one armed hug that ends as soon as it has started.

“It’s been too long, bro,” he says, “should’ve kept in touch.” And Eddy doesn’t feel so nervous anymore. 

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi. Thank you for reading.  
> 


	2. Nocturne

[ _Lili Boulanger, Nocturne _ ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qj-3bUS41c8)

The coffee is stronger and more bitter than Brett usually likes it, lingers on his tongue and in the back of his mouth, and yet it’s good, warmth that spreads down to his chest. It’s windy outside, branches swaying, coats flapping, but Eddy ushered them inside this coffee shop, red, _coffee yeah?,_ and everything stopped, paused, the wind, the sound, the smell of something salty in the air, _thought you needed it,_ everything went dormant, fog up his glasses and at the edges of the windows, _long trip, hey?,_ warm and comfortable _._

And now he’s sitting here, with coffee that’s too strong and too bitter, facing someone he hasn’t seen in forever, watching people outside still battling the wind, tired – the tiredness he recognizes, still, he hasn’t had much time to catch up on sleep, but the rest of it feels strange, like a dream. Not bad though. Just strange.

It’s vaguely familiar, this situation – warm instead of cold under his fingers, but familiar, that look across the table, the fidgeting, again.

When Brett was seventeen, all braces and glasses and just a dash of brashness, he came to the conclusion that whatever thoughts of a career outside of music he had been entertaining, those were merely a fantasy meant to distract himself – and his family – from the reality of what he wanted. The deliberation had been awfully short, too.

Coming to terms with his decision was easy – almost like he’d always known anyway. Telling everyone else was not.

Eddy learned first. Because at that time, Eddy was always the first to learn, when it came to matters related to music – or others, sometimes. Eddy learned first, because even though Brett knew that his parents probably wouldn’t oppose it – he’d won enough competitions to be labelled as ‘gifted’, whatever that meant – but there was more than a step, going from winning competitions to telling your parents that you were going to do just that for the rest of your life.

And the memory stuck, somehow – Eddy sitting across from him, fidgeting with his bubble tea, always fidgeting, then, hair too long, fake glasses that Brett didn’t know what to think about, eyes growing a bit wide. Soft, too, despite the angles. Delighted, perhaps even more than Brett. He remembers the smile. Out of most things about Eddy, he always remembers his smiles.

There’s no telling why that particular day stuck to him, why he remembers telling Eddy more vividly that he remembers telling his parents, but even now, a whole decade and a half later, it’s not difficult to look back and see a much younger Eddy, sitting in front of him just like now, fidgeting with his shirt or his fingers.

He doesn’t really know why the thought pops back into his brain right now. This Eddy, upon closer inspection, is very, _very_ different from the one from fifteen years ago, taller and broader and more confident, perhaps, something about the way his eyes land on his surroundings, something in the way he moves. Brett feels something in the back of his throat at that thought, foreign, doesn’t quite know what to do with it. Of course Eddy wasn’t going to be the same person he was when he was sixteen. Of course they’ve both grown up and changed, and it was always going to be just this little bit awkward, there’s nothing there, no regrets. But it almost feels like he misses Eddy, and he hadn’t really thought about it before now.

“Brett? Hey?”

Brett looks up at the man sitting across the table. Different.

“Hmmm?”

Eddy still smiles like before, though it is half hidden against the palm of his hand. And there’s still that thing in his eyes, quiet delight at something that Brett can’t quite grasp.

“Sorry, I drifted away for a moment there,” Brett says, trying to return the smile.

His fingers shift around the coffee mug, a little bit restless. He’s feeling warmer now, and his glasses have unfogged. It feels comfortable. Eddy’s eyes flutter from the table to his face and then back, his fingers tear at the edge of a paper napkin. It makes Brett just a little bit nervous.

“Yeah, I saw.”

“I was thinking – did you know you were the first to know I was going to study music?”

He doesn’t know why he says it like that, but Eddy’s smile grows bigger, before it dims a little again.

“Everybody knew, Brett. Everybody knew. It was very obvious. You were the only one who thought it might not have been.”

There’s a moment of silence. Eddy looks outside, Brett follows his gaze. There’s nothing much to see. The wind has died down, the sun is shining. He’s not really sure what he’s doing there.

“I really needed the coffee,” Eddy says eventually, in a transparent attempt to fill the silence.

“Addicted, uh?”

Eddy laughs. A little awkward. He looks good.

Almost unfairly so.

“Ah. I drink too much coffee. Probably. Got me through med school though.”

“Dude... Well, same, really. I'm still convinced that student life is just a coffee-fuelled dream.”

“RIP boba,” Eddy sighs.

“You don’t drink it anymore?”

“Not as much as coffee.”

There is something that flashes on Eddy’s face, which hits Brett somewhere between the ribs, a mischievous little glint that reminds him of roping Eddy in to help with whatever joke he’d planned, reminds him of music camp and coming up with weird ideas that had everyone else raise their eyebrows, of tired whispering about stuff no one else needed to know. A pang in his chest. He’s always felt that, the need to grab Eddy by the wrist and drag him along through life. Forgot about it with time, but it’s still there. Eddy doesn’t look like he needs to be dragged anymore.

“Yeah, no, I retract it, you look tired. Have your coffee.”

“Hey, you don’t exactly look all springy yourself,” Eddy protests, and isn’t that true.

“I meant it in a good way. The good kind of tired.”

Eddy smiles. “Oh, is there a good kind?”

Brett shifts a little, pushes his ankle against the violin case on the ground. There is a good kind. He looks at Eddy, at the openness in his posture. There is definitely a good kind.

“Hmmm. You look accomplished. That’s the good kind,” Brett says, and Eddy goes bright red, makes Brett want to laugh, but he’s too kind to point it out straight away.

“Bro,” Eddy stumbles, “You’re famous.”

“Hardly.”

“But you are,” Eddy mumbles, looking down. He looks... he looks shy, for a moment, quite a departure from the previous confidence. “You’ll tell me about it?” he asks, not really looking at Brett, “How it all is, the concerts and all?”

Under the table, Brett’s fingers fall just short of brushing against his violin case. Outside the coffee shop, the wind picks up again. They barely hear it. He can see the tip of Eddy’s ears turning red. It’s funny.

It would be wrong to say that Brett touched a violin for the first time, and immediately knew that it was his life. It was a progressive thing. Eddy Chen came somewhere in the middle, almost immediately part of the deal. There was a time – well, whatever...

He promises, of course. It’s not a question he’s never heard before. It’s not a surprise, either, that Eddy would be curious about it.

It feels a little surreal, being lead into Eddy’s world like this, _there’s my hospital over there, you can just about see the roof,_ following for once, the town, how it’s different from what he expected, _let’s get take out for later, yeah,_ how Eddy is different too, and the same, and it’s confusing, _confession time, I’m not really a great cook._ The sudden flash of sea at the turn of a road surprises him more than expected, everything blue and open once they leave town.

“Oh!”

It escapes him, almost against his will. He thinks about Eddy, seventeen, in music camp, practicing bits of _la mer_ on his own, all limbs and weird facial expressions. Doesn’t know why.

“Pretty, uh?” Eddy says, eyes on the road, like he’s used to the reaction, like he gets it every time when...

“Yeah, I – didn’t expect. We should go down there, someday. No?”

“Hmm. We should. Pebbles though.”

It’s confident Eddy again, the one that makes Brett a little sad for some reason, and Brett nods, keeps his eyes on the horizon, hazy.

It comes slowly, bumpy and uneven, as the hours tick away, sharing food. Eddy talks about med school, gets over his embarrassment as he does, and Brett looks more than he listens at moments, finds him shiny, like he didn’t know that Eddy could be, and Brett talks about music uni, and practice, practice, practice, and how it slowly took over everything else, and Eddy listens, looks genuinely impressed for reasons that Brett can’t possibly imagine, and Brett thinks about the sea, ebb and flows, eroded cliffs and rounded pebbles, gently drifting back towards each other.

Falling asleep doesn’t come easy, residual excitement travelling through Eddy in sparks. He drifts in and out of sleep, and he’s not sure for how long – could be just a couple of hour, could be most of the night.

He keeps thinking about things he’s said, things Brett’s said, the way his eyes just were, softer than before, and the awkwardness – it’s that, more than anything, that keeps him awake, how very unimpressive he thinks he’s been, and it’s a remainder of him as a kid, trying to really impress people, even Brett. And he thought that he’d grown out of it, or maybe – he cringes just thinking about it – he thought that he was impressive enough not to need the effort. He’s always wanted to impress Brett.

He’s never really forgotten Brett, but never really thought about him much either, thoughts in passing, memories sometimes. He doesn’t really know what to do about it now, uncertain about the way to behave. They’re not best friends anymore – too much time away from each other – but Eddy sort of wants them to be something again.

Brett’s always been great. Eddy can’t remember when exactly he realised, but it was more acceptance than surprise. Brett’s always been great. He’s even better now.

His thoughts run in circles. He’s too old to think that, but he does, _I want to be your friend again._

Maybe he falls asleep at some point. Maybe he’s too much in his head to notice when it starts. But suddenly he hears the sound of violin playing.

It’s soft and muted, light enough that Eddy doesn’t know if he’s dreaming it or not. He doesn’t know the piece, but it’s pretty enough that Eddy feels like his brain is slowly being enveloped in silk, or gently dipped in water, music trickling up from some place in the house in careful waves.

It takes a moment before Eddy can figure out what is going on.

He’s careful when he eventually gets out of bed. Brett’s playing something in one of the rooms downstairs, and Eddy doesn’t want to disturb him. It’s too beautiful to be interrupted.

He has no idea how late it is – maybe he’s really dreaming after all, the violin definitely sounds like a dream – but everything is entirely dark around the house, soft blues and long shadows through the windows, from where he is he can just about see the stars – it’s a dream, surely, it can’t be anything but a dream. It’s a miracle that Eddy doesn’t just trip on something and goes tumbling down the stairs.

Brett is in the music room, like Eddy predicted, his silhouette carved out in dark shapes against the muted lights, and it’s something else, really. Eddy would feel a little uneasy for the way he spies, settled down on the couch, cold feet tucked under his thighs, craning his neck to see the way Brett moves with ease, every movement controlled but natural. It’s fascinating.

It almost feels like he’s intruding on something private, but fuck, it’s beautiful. 

He’s fallen asleep to Brett’s playing before, fluttering memories of notes swaying around him, seeping in, his face propped up against his palm or mushed against the cushions of his mom’s couch, halfway through giving his opinion on something. He’s fallen asleep to Brett talking to him, chin hitting his chest mid anecdote, much to Brett’s amusement. He’s fallen asleep to recordings and movies, and countless videos, head slowly falling onto Brett’s shoulder.

And again he falls asleep like that, neck stretched, phantom thoughts of lullabies and fluttering fingers soothing him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ah, yes. Hello.
> 
> Sorry for the lack of updates. I was caught in the throes of ‘none of this is worth the effort’ and ‘these fics are bad – delete’ again. It’s not a secret, I think, how ambivalent my feelings towards writing are (love the process, hate the product). And that’s all I have to say in my defence – though I do not think I should need one anyway. All this to say, sorry, I’ll try to be better, can’t promise I won’t be worse. 
> 
> All my love and thanks for reading, though.  
> See you next month, maybe (next year?). Take care of yourselves.


End file.
